IRON working has a long history in our area, extending back to Roman times when small scale smelting took place, using local deposits in North Yorkshire.

It continued in medieval times with iron working at Rievaulx and Whitby Abbeys as well as at Guisborough Priory in the 17th century.

But it really came in to its own once Middlesbrough had been founded in the early 19th century and iron deposits were discovered locally, which prompted Bolckow and Vaughan to open their first iron works in 1841.

By 1855 there were 30 blast furnaces along the banks of the Tees.

This had increased to 100 by 1875 when industrial giant Dorman Long was founded, producing two million tons of iron per annum.

By 1879 iron was making way for new technology of steel production and the first integrated steel works were opened in 1902 at Cargo Fleet.

Dorman Long snapped up many of its smaller rivals and in 1929 merged with the Bolckow Vaughan company.

And in 1930 the Teesside Bridge and Engineering Works Ltd was taken under the Dorman Long wing.

This expanded its horizons and led to it being involved in prestige contracts all over the world, including the Sydney Harbour Bridge which was officially opened in 1932.

Dorman Long built a new facility at Lackenby and, following nationalisation, the British Steel Company built the Redcar steel works and iron ore terminal at the mouth of the river.

For just over a decade from 1946 steel firms on Teesside, West Hartlepool and Skinningrove accounted for 80% of the steel output in the North and 16% nationally. By the mid 70s, 28,000 people were kept busy working in metal manufacturing.

In the 1950s the Redcar site had two blast furnaces each capable of producing 500 tonnes of liquid iron per day.

The Redcar site also had a steel plant and rolling mill.

In 1967 Dorman Long, South Durham Steel Iron Co, and Stewart and Lloyds came together to create British Steel and Tube Ltd. This became the nationalised British Steel Corporation, which in 1989 was privatised and became British Steel plc.

The existing Redcar Ironworks site development began in 1973 with the opening of the Redcar ore terminal, which allowed raw materials to be imported from around the world.

The Redcar sinter plant, coke ovens and pellet plant were opened in 1978 and a year later Europe’s biggest blast furnace began operation at Redcar.

In 1986 after seven years of operation the Redcar Blast Furnace was ‘blown out’ for a 135-day rebuild.

At this point around 15m tonnes of liquid iron had been produced.

On August 12, 1986, the furnace was re-lit by then British Steel chairman Sir Bob Scholey.

On June 18, 1997, the total amount of iron produced by the Redcar iron making site reached 50 million tonnes, making Redcar one of the largest iron making areas in the world.

The then British Steel chairman Sir Brian Moffatt unveiled a commemorative plaque in the blast furnace control room.

British Steel plc operated as a public company until it was merged with the Dutch steel manufacturer Hoogovens, to form Corus in 1999.

Corus itself was taken over in 2007 by Indian company Tata.

In recent times steel from Teesside has continued to make its mark on landmark projects such as the Millennium Dome, the Millennium rugby stadium in Cardiff, the world's tallest building in Malaysia and the Canary Wharf tower in London.

Production continues at sites across Teesside - including Skinningrove and Hartlepool.

And Teesside is now waiting for a new chapter in its history to start.

It’s now more than three months since news of a £320m takeover for Teesside Cast Products emerged with the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Tata Steel and Thailand’s SSI.

While not yet a “done deal”, both company bosses and unions are confident that the acquisition will be completed soon - and will see the restarting of steelmaking at the site by early next year.